What's Recently Happened:
The Kouts High School badminton club has officially been announced and they have already had their first meeting. The meeting was Thursday, March 31 from 3 to 5 p.m.
Students were able to bring their own racquets but it was not necessary.
Meetings will only be once a month for the foreseeable future until a second coach is found.
The goals of the club include continue pushing interest next year, recruiting more members, having fun, and eventually becoming a full sport at KHS. With 47 members interested in the club, these goals have a great chance of being achieved.
The April meeting was on April 7, but the May meeting has yet to be announced.
What's Coming Up:
Prom 2022 is quickly approaching for the junior and senior students at KHS. The magical date will be Saturday, April 23 from 6:30 to 11 p.m. at the Duneland Falls Banquet and Meeting Center in Chesterton, Indiana.
This year the theme is "enchanted garden" with the print on a ticket reading "a night to remember."
Unlike in the past years, this year KHS will be conducting a Grand March in the gym at 5 p.m. that will be open to parents and pictures.
Tickets for prom are being sold for a two week period from March 29 up until April 8. Tickets cost $55 per person and $100 per couple.
If students want to bring a guest from another school, they may do so after picking up a guest form from the office, having both students sign it, and having the form returned to the principal for review before buying the tickets.
Some of the chaperones in charge of keeping the students safe throughout the night are Carol Flanigan, an English Teacher at KHS, and Chad Franks, principal of the Porter County Career Center. Students at KHS are excited for a night of dancing and revelry with their close friends.
Staff Spotlight:
Jeff Wisniewski is the United States history teacher at KHS, but he also teaches humanities and current events. In his senior year of high school, he made his career choice.
“My senior year of high school I decided that I no longer wanted to be a lawyer so I thought about what I would like to do for a living. I figured I loved everything about school (academics, athletics, school spirit, etc) so maybe I should make a career of it. I chose history since it had always been my favorite subject in school.” he said.
History has stayed one of Wisniewski’s favorite subjects, and he has enjoyed teaching it in the present as much as he has enjoyed learning about it in the past.
“Despite what people think, history is constantly evolving and impacting us in the present. I am constantly changing things from year to year to address new viewpoints, discoveries, and facts,” he said.
The best teachers will connect with their students in order for the students to connect with what they’re learning and actually enjoy the topics and lessons. Wisniewski naturally does this.
“I try to connect things from the past to today,” he said.
According to Wisniewski, because of current events, it has become easier to make these connections.
As a history teacher, Wisniewski has his own favorite time periods to teach as well as a favorite historical figure, though that does not necessarily mean that this hasn’t changed throughout time.
“In high school, I would have said the Civil War. In college, my favorite time period was the Vietnam War Era. Early in my teaching career I would have said World War II. But now I really enjoy teaching the Antebellum period, the time in our country just prior to the Civil War. There were many dynamic historical figures in this time period that I find intriguing,” Wisniewski said.
His favorite historical figure is Abraham Lincoln.
“Having grown up in Illinois has a lot to do with this. I also took a college course at Indiana University Bloomington that was entirely on the life of Abraham Lincoln. I just find his journey to be very fascinating,” Wisniewski said.
If Wisniewski could live in any time period though, it would be Chicago for the 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition. It can be easily seen why Wisniewski’s class is a favorite with how knowledgeable and passionate he is about the subject that he teaches.
Student Spotlight:
Hunter Wood, a senior at KHS, is the captain of the Math Academic Team.
On March 17, 2022, the Math Team placed second in the competition at Washington Township, a feat Wood hasn’t seen in his four years of competing in the Academic Super Bowl. Wood is still riding on cloud nine from this triumphant win. His reaction to the placing was pure joy.
“The math team has never placed as long as I have been a part of it, so it was really awesome to see what we learned coming to fruition,” he said.
The next goal for the team was the Area competition on Tuesday, April 19, 2022, at Wheeler High School. The math team won their division and qualified for the state competiion on Saturday, May 7, 2022.
Wood was cautiously optimistic for the math team concerning the area competition and the qualification for State.
“Fingers crossed. We have put a lot of work in this year, and hopefully, we will improve from this competition and qualify for state,” he said.
According to Wood what led to the team’s victory was just good old-fashioned practice.
“Just being able to learn the different topics, and then apply them quickly during competition,” he said.
The topics that math team covers a wide range of topics but the team mainly focuses on algebra, geometry, and calculus. A typical practice of the team in the morning is practicing these topics and going over practice questions to further imprint the mathematical concepts or be introduced to a new topic.
Regardless of how simple their strategy appears, it has been doing wonders for this group of talented students.